buyafriendabook.com  

I am giving a friend a book through a drawing to celebrate Buy a Friend a Book Week. I know you and I may not actually be friends yet, but maybe I can buy your friendship with the possibility of a free book.

I found out about this Buy a Friend a Book Week over at Di’s blog. I thought it would be fun to be a copycat.

If you comment (following instructions below), you will be entered to win a copy of The Radioactive Boy Scout.* I pick this book because, out of all the books we read this last year, it was one we ALL read. Each of us, all four, read this book cover to cover and enjoyed it. It was a bit of a page turner. I’m sure not everyone would find it interesting, but if it sounds good to you, leave a comment.

Here’s what I wrote on the 9th of June, back when we initially read it:

A Science “Must Read”
Our whole family is in the process of reading a wild green-and-red-covered book. Dad and Son have finished it, and Daughter is in the middle of it. I’ve got to get it read before the end of next week, or I’ll miss out because it’s due back at the library. The title is The Radioactive Boy Scout: The Frightening True Story of a Whiz Kid and His Homemade Nuclear Reactor.

Here’s the synopsis from Amazon.com since the book is off in my daughter’s room right now, so I can’t type up the blurb from the back of the book:

Growing up in suburban Detroit, David Hahn was fascinated by science. While he was working on his Atomic Energy badge for the Boy Scouts, David’s obsessive attention turned to nuclear energy. Throwing caution to the wind, he plunged into a new project: building a model nuclear reactor in his backyard garden shed.Posing as a physics professor, David solicited information on reactor design from the U.S. government and from industry experts. Following blueprints he found in an outdated physics textbook, David cobbled together a crude device that threw off toxic levels of radiation. His wholly unsupervised project finally sparked an environmental emergency that put his town’s forty thousand suburbanites at risk. The EPA ended up burying his lab at a radioactive dumpsite in Utah. This offbeat account of ambition and, ultimately, hubris has the narrative energy of a first-rate thriller.

Anyway, it’s a story that’s captured our attention. And it would be interesting read for many students in chemistry or the high school sciences. My son really enjoyed the story.Please do read the reviews at Amazon because it sounds like the author might have had an agenda that colored his telling of the story. But regardless, The Radioactive Boy Scout is one book that shows resourcefulness and creative thinking of the highest order. My family sat around talking about how David did so much with so little. It really makes you think. And I bet there’s more to the story that wasn’t told.Now, we’re wondering what David Hahn is up to now. We’re hoping he’s not really sick from all the radiation he must have been exposed to.

The drawing is sometime next Monday, January 8, 2007, barring sickness, accidents, or homeschooling mishaps. I’ll have my kid(s) do it. Names in a hat or bowl.

INSTRUCTIONS:

For those also BAFAB-ing: If you are BAFAB-ing this week, please fill out the Mr. Linky link to your web site.

For those wanting a book: You must comment with at least your FIRST NAME and STATE and TITLE of an educational book you would recommend. You must want to read Radioactive Boy Scout; otherwise, what’s the point, right? You must be willing to wait about a month for the book (since it will be part of my own Amazon order that I’ll be placing later today and I use the slow shipping because I am frugal and patient ::eyeroll::). You must be willing to email me your snailmail address if your name is drawn. You must be able to deal with a book that has never been read, but could quite possibly get dinged up a bit in shipping. (The USPS is good, but they don’t always get things where they’re going in perfect condition.) You must come back on Monday, January 8, 2007, to see if you won because I won’t be able to contact you because I won’t have your email address even if you fill it in, so bookmark this site now and mark your calendar and come back on Monday. You must be able to put up with all stated rules.

For those who fall into both categories above: Link and comment as described above.

*Some parents will want to pre-read this book before giving it to your teens. There’s bound to be something in it offensive to someone.

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